After more than 50 years serving at St. Agnes Parish in Phoenix, the Carmelite priests are departing. They leave behind a parish imbued with Carmelite spirituality and a community that has been deeply affected by it.
Joan Gore, a parishioner since the early 1960s, said she and her husband raised seven children in the neighborhood and sent them all to St. Agnes Catholic School. As a Third Order Carmelite, Gore has great love for the 800-plus-year-old order and its members.
“All of them have been so dear to me through the years,” Gore said. “I start crying when I think about it because they’ve always been dear friends, all of them. I’m going to miss them terribly.”
Fr. Bradley Peterson, O. Carm., has been pastor for 17 years and served as the parochial vicar for two years prior to that.
After his family relocated to the Valley when Fr. Peterson was 16, they joined St. Agnes Parish. Fr. Peterson said he was already discerning a call to the priesthood at the time and was moved by the example of the Carmelite priests who served at the parish.
“They were great role models,” Fr. Peterson said. “They invited me to be a priest in a Carmelite way. One of them gave me the collected works of St. John of the Cross.”
It wasn’t easy for a teenage boy to work his way through the writings of the16th century mystic, but Fr. Peterson felt drawn to the saint’s search for God in all things. Amazingly, he was ordained to the priesthood at St. Agnes in 1992, the same church he grew up in and where he would one day serve as pastor.
“I was ordained right in front of the altar where I celebrate Mass,” Fr. Peterson said. “It’s a constant reminder of what the Church asked me to do with the rest of my life.”
The Carmelite priests who served at St. Agnes through the years were “a blessing to the people here and were blessed by the people here,” Fr. Peterson said. Many parishioners through the years embraced the Carmelite way of life.
Intense prayer
There are active Third Order Carmelite groups for both English and Spanish-speakers at St. Agnes as well as at parishes around the Diocese of Phoenix. Those groups will continue even after Fr. Peterson and his parochial vicar, Fr. Jorge Monteroso, O. Carm., leave the parish.
Gore, who is a member of the English Third Order Carmelites at St. Agnes, said a friend talked her into joining years ago. “It’s changed my life,” she said. “I’m much more prayerful than I used to be.”
Third Order Carmelites commit to a life of intense prayer, devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary and follow the Lord Jesus in the spirit of Carmel. They go through a period of formation and attend regular meetings. Thousands of Third Order Carmelites throughout the world lead lives of prayer and community, praying the Liturgy of the Hours daily and participating in the sacramental life of the Church. In fact, the Discalced Carmelites — a separate branch of the order but closely related — held their annual conference in Phoenix June 19-22 and drew around 450 participants, including clergy, religious and lay members it calls seculars.
Third Order Carmelites make “first promises to live in their state of life as closely to the Carmelite way of life as possible — a life of simplicity, prayer and community,” Fr. Peterson said. “Even if they’re married with children, they can live similar to how we live and dedicate themselves to Our Lady and Elijah the Prophet.” Carmelites trace their origins to the prophet Elijah, famous for hearing God’s “still, small voice” and Mary, who “pondered all these things in her heart” and focused on Christ.
Fr. Peterson said he has many great memories of his years at St. Agnes. He has loved the diversity of the community, though at the beginning of his service, he didn’t know much Spanish. The people, he said, have been very welcoming.
“They are similar to the people I grew up with in Iowa. Everyone pitches in when there’s something to do,” he said. The parish’s annual fiesta is an example of that and a beloved tradition that brings people together. “It’s more about building community than it is about making money,” Fr. Peterson said.
Lasting impact
Fr. Jorge Monterroso, O. Carm., who has served as parochial vicar for five years at St. Agnes, said he also has many wonderful memories from serving the parish but he focused on two that stood out.
The first one had to do with when he first arrived at the parish in the midst of the Covid crisis. Volunteer catechists offered to record videos in English and Spanish so that students could continue their formation and sacramental preparation.
“Their zeal for their ministry was and continues to be inspiring because it says a lot about their commitment to the community as well as their call to bring the Good News to every corner of the world.”
The other memory Fr. Monterroso shared was about a school Mass. He said he always appreciated the students’ openness and willingness to learn. At one school Mass, he held up a “Where’s Waldo” photo. “I explained to them that finding Jesus is much easier if they were attentive to His presence in their lives. I think that Mass was one of my favorites.”
Carmelite spirituality will continue to have a lasting impact on the parish even after Fr. Peterson and Fr. Monterroso leave, particularly when it comes to prayer.
Parishioners and students have learned that prayer is “more than something complicated to do, it’s something that arises from them in an intentional and personal way. More than the quantity of words they speak, God sees their willingness to pray, something that allows them to be themselves when they speak with God,” Fr. Monterroso said.
St. Agnes was established as a parish in 1940 when the area was still farmland and 24th Street was a dirt road. Carmelite priests came aboard in the early 1970s just after the Diocese of Phoenix was established in 1969.
In March, the diocese announced that the Carmelites would be leaving the parish. Nazareth Seminary, the Diocese of Phoenix full seminary that was established in 2023, is expanding to a fourth house to be located at St. Agnes in 2026. Fr. Paul Sullivan, rector of the seminary, has been appointed pastor of St. Agnes and will begin serving there July 1. A
special Mass with Bishop Dolan that paid tribute to the Carmelites was held at St. Agnes June 7.
Bishop John Dolan noted that the Carmelites filled a gap for the diocese at a time when vocations were needed. “It was a very difficult time and they were here to serve us faithfully. And they did it for many years.”
Fr. Peterson, the bishop noted, “brought with him his own love for Phoenix because this was his family’s parish for many years.” The Carmelite priests who have served at St. Agnes through the years shared their rich charisms with the community.
The legacy of the Carmelite tradition — especially prayer and a love for Our Lady “will remain here through them.”
